RIP Eddy VanHalen

This year seems to suck a little more each week.

He was one of a kind. I am glad I got hear music

Toyman01 (Moderately Supportive Dude) said:

I blame Van Halen on much of my hearing loss. 

I tell my wife this when she can't hear me.  
 

In reply to aircooled :

Two handed tapping? No, he wasn't the first but he definitely popularized it.

In reply to aircooled :

Some people say it first popped up on a Led Zepplien song, and there's a host of other stories there.

He was the one that popularized it though definitely

This one hurts bad. REAL bad. 

I was born in 1982, right in the height of Van Halen's power, and some of my earliest music memories revolved around listening to them. They were the epitome of cool; NO ONE was cooler. My older sister and cousins were always blasting Van Halen, and some of my first cassettes were beat up copies of Van Halen II and 1984 that they gave me once they got new copies. Van Halen's music equaled fun to me, and I have countless memories of good times with their music as the soundtrack:

-First time I ever saw a 1979 Trans Am, it was in front of my uncle's house on the beach, blasting Panama with the T-Tops off. That moment is seared into my brain forever. 

-Speaking of which, Panama was banned in my own 1979 Trans Am. Every single time that song came on, the car would break down. It did it worst in front of a cute girl in a XJ Cherokee that used to shop at the Autozone I worked at. She pulled up next to me at a light, we started talking right as the "quiet part" came on, she asked me to do a burnout, and the car died. She laughed at me every time she saw me from then on. Damn Panama! 

-My dad and I christened our new Fisher stereo component system in 1988 with VH's 1984 on cassette. The whole neighborhood shook. It was awesome. 

-I had an impromptu drum duel with Mike Mangini (Dream Theater, Extreme, Annihilator, etc) to Hot For Teacher at my old band's practice space. He was in a cover band with the rehersal space's owner at the time and we loved trolling the owner. Needless to say, he won. He was super cool about it too! 

...and so many more. 

Eddie's playing was revolutionary. He changed the game forever and influenced countless musicians. Looking on social media today, so many of my musical heroes are posting the same kinds of stories about Eddie and Van Halen.  It's truly amazing to see. 

As sad as I am, and I usually don't get too bent out of shape over celebrities I've never met, his music and genius will live on forever. 

Cancer sucks. 2020 is the berking WORST. RIP Edward Van Halen. 
 

Tonight the strat goes drop D and the neighbors will hear me kinda play Unchained. RIP Eddie you were the reason so many picked up a guitar.

A few years ago--maybe close to 10, I don't remember--I made a list of bands we haven't seen and need to. It wasn't a long list: Devo, Soundgarden, Van Halen, Living Colour. We ticked all of those boxes, and all were stellar performances. People would cry that DLR couldn't fit those notes any longer. Who cares. He happily held that entire audience in the palm of his hand.  

Datsun310Guy said:

Toyman01 (Moderately Supportive Dude) said:

I blame Van Halen on much of my hearing loss. 

I tell my wife this when she can't hear me.  
 

1984. I was about 17. 3 friends and I piled into a ratty old Volvo and drove 2 hours to go see their 1984 concert in Columbia SC. They actually cracked the roof in the Carolina Coliseum. The news the next day said you could hear the concert for 17 blocks. I frequently tried to recreate that SPL through out the rest of my high school career. 

5150 was my defining experience with Eddie. I was on a school field trip, listening to Boston - Third Stage on my walkman. I thought all the songs sounded the same. 
then a classmate asked me if I would trade my Boston tape for her VH tape (5150). 
i listened to that tape over and over. I don't usually do that, but the album just grabbed me. 
that album changed the way I listened to music, and the music I listened to. 
i have worn out a few cassets and messed up a few 5150 CDs. I think I've bought that album 5-6 times. 
the perfect line up is Eddie, Alex, Michael, and Sammy. 
i'm glad he put out soo much music, I have plenty to listen to. 
and yeah, VH was the soundtrack of my youth. I don't usually care about celeb deaths, but this one sucks. 

This is a pit of sadness. Thank you for the music Eddie.

Maybe Darrell will let you play that Charvel again.

In reply to DrBoost :

Field trip tape swapping was THE BEST. I found so many great albums that way!

People always crap on "Van Hagar". I don't. They were different than Diamond Dave-fronted VH, but man, they were rock solid. 5150 is one of the best rock records ever made. I was actually watching some concert footage of their stop in New Haven CT on the 5150 tour on YouTube. They even play a few Hagar solo songs, and man, they shred with the Van Halen band behind Hagar! 
 

Lost a legend. I'd say the best guitar hero of all. 

I heard this from Mrs. Dx on the way to dinner tonight. She said Van Halen passed. I asked which one and she said Eddie. Ohh man . Often imitated never duplicated.

VH1 imho is one of the top debut albums ever recorded. 

Dimebag and Eddie will be one heckuva shred team up in the sky. Isn't Eddie's black and yellow strat buried with Dimebag?

In reply to dxman92 :

Add Dick Dale to that list. We lost him last year. Without Dick Dale, would we have ever had EVH and so many other greats? I wonder. 

Sorta related, but who is today are today's guitar heroes? If we're talking about performers who influence people to pick up the instrument, I'm putting Taylor Swift on that list. Seriously. 

David S. Wallens said:

Sorta related, but who is today are today's guitar heroes? If we're talking about performers who influence people to pick up the instrument, I'm putting Taylor Swift on that list. Seriously. 

There are not any.

Jump! Was the very first song I ever remember liking as a little kid. Saw them on their last (2015) tour. Pretty sad.  :( 

David S. Wallens said:

Sorta related, but who is today are today's guitar heroes? If we're talking about performers who influence people to pick up the instrument, I'm putting Taylor Swift on that list. Seriously. 

If you were a kid growing up in the 80s, he was probably THE biggest rock star for almost 10 full years. I don't think that sort of thing exists anymore.

Eddie made every high school kid from that era believe that they could play the guitar the way that he could. But none of them could.

I'm not trying to say that he was the best ever, but just that his was a singular talent. We will undoubtedly see other forms of brilliance in the future, but it's unlikely that someone will duplicate what Eddie meant to music in the 80s. He redefined the guitar within rock and roll.

To build on that premise, I think nothing reinforces the idea better than Beat It.

By 1983, Michael Jackson had already been an established superstar for about 13 years. His music was the polar opposite of Van Halen. But then along came Beat It, and he blew the world away. And aside from the video and its impact on MTV, the song's most defining characteristic was the guitar solo. The song became huge, huge, huge before anyone even realized that Eddie was involved.

By that point in the 80s, people just assumed that that was what a guitar solo was supposed to sound like.

And that was because of Eddie Van Halen.

wheelsmithy (Joe-with-an-L) (Forum Supporter) said:

Throat cancer.

Godspeed, Eddie Van. These two will have to wait til the afterlife to get you in their band.

 

But, they did die once.

Literally every other song on the radio today is Van Halen.

David S. Wallens said:

In reply to dxman92 :

Add Dick Dale to that list. We lost him last year. Without Dick Dale, would we have ever had EVH and so many other greats? I wonder. 

Back when I was still a runner, I would run through the woods while listening to the Best of Dick Dale through my headphones. 

Don’t do that. Dick Dale will berkeleying kill you if you make that mistake. 

My friend Emon just shared this. At the 25-minute mark, EVH explains where the tapping came from.

Ian F (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to aircooled :

Two handed tapping? No, he wasn't the first but he definitely popularized it.

Sadly, it turns out Belew has deleted this post as apparently the comments turned into a pissing match about who invented tapping... 

I definitely agree with the comparison between EVH and Swift. She has made a ton of (mainly girls) pick up the guitar.  There's a solid chance that rock music will look and sound a lot different 20 years from now.  And aging curmudgeons like me will moan about it and continue to listen mostly to the music of our youth.  Just like our parents and grandparents before us.

I only saw VH once - in 1988 during the Monsters of Rock tour at JFK Stadium in Philly (one of the last events done there).  Unfortunately, I don't really have solid memories of the show although I do still have a t-shirt from it somewhere.

About the specific style that Eddie did...

He may not have been the first to do any of his techniques, but I think he was the first to put most of them together at the same time, include a LOT of classical and jazz harmonies and techniques- all in the context of big hair hard rock.  

Putting really amazing music out using techniques like that transcends the genere of music, by a mile.

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

Having seen some classical guitar concerts, tapping was written into many classical pieces.  Which mean neither invented it.  It's more a factor of adapting techniques to do something new.  And with all due respect to Belew- I have no idea who he is.  Whereas I very much know Eddie Van Halen, and was amazed by what he did way back as a kid.  And I was not a guitar person.